


putting out fire with gasoline

by callmearcturus



Category: Homestuck
Genre: (has a larger cast than the alphas but that's spoilers), Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Heists and Lies and Competent People Doing Unrealistic Things, Integrated Troll/Human Society, Jamfic, M/M, Spies and Criminals AU, Ten Minutes In The Future setting, it'll be a fucking ROMP i promise, look its Leverage meets pulpy spy fiction set to Bowie
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-22
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-03-22 09:26:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13761147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callmearcturus/pseuds/callmearcturus
Summary: Jake English has a lot of trouble getting the rest of MI6 to take him seriously, given his lack of field experience and the rumored nepotism linked to that famous name.Falling in with a cadre of professional thieves and wandering into an interstellar conspiracy probably will not help his case much. But who knows? It's better career prospects than he's used to.





	1. cold open: skyfall

_The Trident_ was a marvel of Alternian technology sitting like a jagged ruby in low orbit above the surface of Earth. From ground level, at night, it caught enough light reflected from the moon to sail through the sky like a shooting star, but red, violent red. It was the old retired maven of the Baronness’ fleet, now resigned to hang in the sky, no longer an interstellar frigate. It’d be retrofit to act as a telecomm satellite years ago.

But there was too much of a good opportunity for the Condessa to pass up. _The Trident_ served as more of a museum than anything, a dressed up tour for rich humans to get a taste of simulated gravity and Alternian ingenuity and blah blah fricken blah.

Tucked into the latest tour group traipsing around the old starlighter was a rogue of some renown. Roxy Lalonde followed along with a particularly photogenic tealblood as they expounded on about the pink tourmaline tile floors, regaling the group with the tale of the thousands of labor hours needed to harvest and process the material into the perfect shade to suit the Condessa’s refined tastes.

“Several tonnes of tourmaline was required to fully pave the floors of this vessel. About three years into the mining operation, a cave-in tragically ended the lives of five olive bloods and an unknown number of rust bloods,” the tour guide explained, smiling as some people stepped out of the group to take pictures of their perfect reflections in the glossy tiles. “The Condessa acted quickly to create a safer mining environment that reduced miner deaths by sixty per cent!”

Roxy whistled softly, rolling her eyes behind her pink mirrored shades. As her gaze rolled lazily around like a marble, she caught the eyes of a handsomely dressed blueblood standing nearby.

As soon as she settled on him, he blushed a rich blueberry hue and looked hurriedly away.

Roxy grinned.

There were many tricks vital to a burglar's repertoire. Hardlining into sensitive mainframes, dangling from very thin wires, jumping between buildings without breaking your damn ankles. All very important, but all paled compared to the careful combination that was:

dressing to impress and walking silently.

And it was a fucking _trial_ to walk silently in heels.

Roxy spent some time making aggressive eye contact at the trolls around her, until even the tour guide was trying to avoid her gaze. Which was the perfect time to slip away as the group moved on to the next room. Roxy hung back, taking a moment to busy herself checking her makeup in a compact mirror, puckering up for her own image as she quietly backed up, out of the room, and around the corner.

She stood there, leaning against the wall, and waited for the sound of the group to completely fade from earshot.

As her dubious luck would have it, someone else turned a far corner while she continued to stare at the backlight map in her mirror. A troll wearing an orange janitorial jumpsuit that clashed hilariously with their horns walked towards her, leading a bucket and mop ahead of them.

Ultimate test time. Roxy clicked her compact shut and started up the same direction. “Right,” she breathed. “Shoulders back, think _murder,_ and walk.”

She strode down the direct center of the hallway. As she approached the janitor, the tension was palpable. Her gaze flicked to them, and as if having anticipated it, the janitor ducked their head, crowding against the wall to let her through.

The greatest test was resisting the urge to whoop in delight. Fuck _yes_ , it was working. Tima knew his shit.

 _The Trident_ wasn’t exactly bursting with personnel to begin with. Really, the biggest trouble was navigating the place. Like most Alternian structures, it was built in circuitous loops and monotone hallways. Almost every door looked like every other door, be they to a treasure vault or crew quarters or to the john. Only a holographic band of Alternian text that lit up at Roxy’s approach hinted at what was hiding on the other side and what kind of security she could expect.

At least this design made it easy for her to walk in circles, coming back to the same stretch of the ship. She had to mentally babelfish every sign, and nothing would break her weird camouflage more than standing like an idiot in front of a door to squint at it. Instead, she strolled up and down until the gaps in her mental map were filled in.

Eventually she found Communication Room (Obsolete) floating over one door. After checking the coast was clear, she grasped at the sliding door with her gloved hands. At the end of each finger, a sharp stabby bit stuck out, like cat claws. It was great for surprise self-defense, but also so getting an old crappy door pried open.

And it was subtle, which was vitally important. With as much as she had to smuggle on board, a crowbar was not feasible.

It took some muscle, but luckily Roxy had exactly some muscle, and soon the door split and gave way under pressure, until she could shove a shoulder through and duck in. It whisked shut after her, nearly catching her skirt, and she bounced away from it with an “eep!”

But inside was dark. Dark and empty in a way that spelled immediate safety. Roxy sighed out a breath, gathering herself.

It was a fairly small room, with about as much walking space as a broom closet. Most of the room was taken up by the huge consoles and displays. The organic framework was old, the lush purple and green carapaces of the insectoid husks dulled from age and lack of care.

She always felt kind of awful for husktech when it was no longer needed. Sure, it wasn’t exactly a high level of sentience, no more than a particularly dim cat, but it still tugged at her heartstrings to see it forgotten and left to essentially die.

“Bet y’all would love some grub right about now,” Roxy whispered, opening her purse and taking out a husktech repair module. Which, to her understanding, was just a concentrated protein shot.

She found the least-intimidating looking console and fix the needle under a groove in the outer shell, injecting the juice inside.

Slowly, the dead-grass green of the shell brightened to a healthier hue, the screen coming alive with a ghastly glow. Good enough. She sat down in front of it and started typing long lines of memorized Alternian code, coaxing the terminal back to operational.

Eventually, she jammed the squishy Enter key a final time, and leaned back, waiting.

There was a click nestled inside her ear as a connection strung into place on her communicator. She reached up to touch it, nudging it more securingly into her ear canal. “Hey, you there?”

The hum of static broke, and Timaeus said: “Ahead of schedule. Everything still on track?”

“Only you would complain about me getting shit done fast. Yeah, everything’s good up here.”

“I was not complaining. Simply making note. We’ll have to wait out about seven minutes to get back to our itinerary. Though there is something poetic about your death by bravado and efficiency.”

“Get off my tits, Tima, it’ll be fine.” She blew a raspberry down the line, just to hear him sigh again. “Wanna burn it now? We can shoot the shit for a bit. Talk about boys or gossip or whatever.”

“We don’t need to close the window all at once. There’s still time for this to go wrong, so lets keep the buffer.”

“Spoilsport.” She leaned back in, adding new lines of code into the revitalized terminal. It hummed happily at her, maybe relieved to have someone there for the first time in ages.

It was nice to have a friendly voice as your guide. Or, _a voice_ , anyway. Roxy hummed as she worked, if only to send sound over the line. “There, try to connect now.”

There was a pause. “Initialized, copying the suite across now. How’d your disguise go?”

“Perfectly! Holy shit, it’s like being a shark in fish tank, no one would even look at me!” Giving the console a pat, Roxy stood, checking her compact again. Her lipstick was a vivid neon pink, her eyeshadow a dustier, classy shade of the same. Her blouse was fuschia, and her skirt black with pink stripes. She looked like a secretarial candy cane, but it _worked._ That’s all that mattered, honestly.

“Yeah, I test ran it last week. It’s pretty dramatic.”

Roxy’s eyebrowed lifted. “ _You_ tried it out? Oh my god. What’d you wear? Are there pictures? Don’t hold out on me.”

Timaeus ignored her. “Suite’s online. Target is down two levels. There’s a maintenance shaft across the hall from you.”

“Ew.” Her nose wrinkled. “I hate Alternian ducts. Reminds me waaaay too much of that one episode of the Magic School Bus.”

“Your window is closing, Rolal. Move it.”

Bossy, but Roxy could feel the sand in the hourglass too, how it was starting to run dry.

The door whisked open neatly, much more availing from this side. Poking her head out, Roxy didn’t see anyone. But this part of the ship was pretty antiquated anyway. The layer of dust all over the old comm room made it clear keeping it pretty wasn’t a priority.

She bent, taking her heels off. For all her talents, crawling through the guts of a building or ship in heels was not one of them. Busting her ass on the way down to the engine room would not make for a smooth getaway later.

Beside the immaculate tile floors, the ship was a hodgepodge of shapes, the organic pieces fused together in ways that were just a little unsettling to human sensibilities. Roxy found the jut of the vent door easily, wincing at the uncomfortable way it seemed to breathe, its grate swaying in and out like respiration. It was a relief to dig her claws into the sides and wrench it free. The meaty noise it made as she did, less so.

“Grosssss,” she muttered. “Gross, gross, gross.”

“You alright?”

“I feel like I’m peeling open a pillbug, it’s gross,” she explained. Shoving her heels into her belt, she heaved herself into the slightly pulsating shaft beyond the wall. “Uuuugh.”

“Whatever. You’ll be fine. Just drop down two floors and don’t break anything.”

“Your concern for my safety is sweet as always,” Roxy grunt, moving laterally into the wall until her feet found the sharp drop a yard in.

“I show concern, you give me shit for not trusting your abilities. I rightfully trust in your talents, and suddenly I’m not worried enough. Make a decision.”

“Nah,” Roxy said, before bracing her foot against the far wall of the drop and starting to slide herself down.

“Drop twelve more meters…” Timaeus said calmly in her ear. “Three more and you’ll be able to feel the exit.”

Skirt hiked up from the drag of her body against the wall, Roxy rolled herself out, towards another grate. The shaft was bumpy and strange under her knees as she crawled forward towards the light, close enough to peer out. It was another hallway, with no distinguishing features to set it apart from the last one she was in.

“Wait,” Timaeus said, and Roxy held her breath.

Then: “Clear.”

Roxy kicked the grate twice, and it buckled under the pressure with a disconcerting crunchy noise. “Ew,” Roxy whined, tumbling out of it and rolling up onto her feet. Even if there was no residue left on her from her trek, she still felt the urge to shower.

She pulled her heels back on. It’d break the disguise pretty badly if she was caught out in just stockings. “Direction?”

“Three o’clock, hard right at the second hallway. There’s a patrol nearby, so keep it quiet.”

“Ten-four, on the move.” Roxy strode along per Timaeus’ directions, quickly sweeping her hair back out of her eyes and into something acceptable for her queenly drag. “Are we gonna ghost this one?”

“Wasn’t planning on it,” he murmured. “All your identification was fake, and they’ll just know _Rolal_ was here when they look at the tapes. I could scrub them if you want.”

She smirked to herself. “I do like making headlines.”

“Well, there you go. Far be it for me to deprive you of your ego trips.”

There was a thread of tension in his voice. Roxy would bet all of the swag in her private warehouse that the average person wouldn’t be able to hear it, but she’d made use of Timaeus’ services so many times over the years, she could detect the edges of his flat mask of smooth baritone. And given his own propensity for discretion, she could understand where it was coming from.

He was a boring square, but she _understood_.

On her way to the engine room, she only ran into one patrol. It was a testament to trolls’ ingrained fear of fuschiabloods that all Roxy had to do was meet their eyes and arch one cruel eyebrow to get them hurrying along past her.

Still, she waited until she could no longer hear their steps before prying the engine room doors open.

“Silent alarm,” Timaeus reported coolly. “Can’t disable it, but I can throw up three more in random rooms and…. jam the doors, locking the tour in the starboard observation deck.”

“They’ll enjoy that,” Roxy commented idly, already distracted by the room she found herself in.

The old engine room made the old comm room look well-kept and meticulously maintained. It was a cavernous, wide room, enough that Roxy imagined it took up almost the entire fore-side of the ship.

It was also a tumble through the wardrobe into an alien land; the clean flat walls and floors of the hallways were a world away from the _growth_ of this room. The angles were all curved, the ceiling with fleshy stretches across rafters like the ribs of some great beast. She stepped forward, and nearly caught on the uneven floors; it looked like cables were left discarded, weaving around the room between husktech and strange devices and a weird _sculpture_ that was the centerpiece of the room: a twisting tornado of thick lurid cables, rising from the ground to the ceiling. A few cables swung freely, hanging limp and empty.

Roxy didn’t know why it felt _empty_ to her, but resolved not to think about it too hard, instead dragging her eyes away to find her prize.

Giving the weird tree-like thing a wide berth, Roxy narrowed in on something much more appealing.

In a shiny glassy case sat a fucking _rock_. It was a crystal easily the side of Roxy’s fist, and glimmered like the soul of glamour, shot through with threads every color of the rainbow, like fiber optics encased in ice. It was set into a dish that shone needle thin lights that bounced through it in impossible patterns.

It was so fucking pretty, Roxy’s fingers itched to hold it. “Got eyes on the Migrant Catalyst,” she breathed.

“Well, consider getting hands on it. Your window is closing.”

She could ask if Timaeus was ready, but she didn’t want to injure his delicate pride. He was _always_ ready. That’s why they all paid him the megabucks.

Another talent of a burglar: the old tried and true smash and grab.

Roxy smashed.

She grabbed.

And the alarms that went of this time were _not_ silent.

Roxy tore out of the engine room at full tilt, heart and feet pounding. At the opposite end of the ship, on this floor, was the closest airlock. She’d been doing sprints for the past two weeks to prepare for this.

“Two guards,” Timaeus instructed. “Leap left, kick off, spin kick. Three, two, one, go.”

Roxy flung herself towards the wall, planted, and shoved. For a second, she was floating, airbourne. One foot flung out, and she felt the kick connect before she even saw the guard. Right in the neck, damn.

“Push,” Timaeus said, and Roxy planted her other foot against the guard and pushed with all her might.

If she were in atmo, Roxy would have paid for this by smashing her face into the floor and probably breaking her nose. Instead, she soared away from the guards… and continued forward, floating six feet off the ground.

Reaching out, she skipped her hand against the wall, and propelled herself faster. No gravity. Some warning would have been nice, but she was happy to fling herself towards the airlock anyway.

The doors slid open for her like a welcoming embrace. She knocked against one edge of the doorframe, twirling to look back down the hallway. There were more people coming her way. Some of them were holding guns.

She hurled her shoes at them. Unfortunately, she didn’t get to see the impact; the doors slid shut again, closing around her like a hug. It left her alone in a small chamber adjacent to the outer hull, and beyond it open space. Gently, she bounced off one wall, drifting through the air.

“If you’re still determined to make this happen, I suggest you get ready.” Timaeus’ voice was tight in that barely perceptible way again.

“Hells to the yes, I am still doing this!” Roxy crowed. “This is going to be incredible, oh my god.” Her hands clutched at her shirt, nearly tearing it as she dragged it out of her belt and up, over her head. It floated away as she continued with her belt, unbuckling it and dragging it loose to shove between her teeth, lest it float off too. With it out of the way, her skirt came off with just a shimmy and a kick.

Underneath was a body suit. While Roxy enjoyed the look of it in the mirror when she was pulling it on this morning, it wasn’t made to tuck and move things into more flattering places. It was a resistant weave baked up by some of the smartest people Roxy knew, giving her a fairly thick layer of padding from her ankles to her wrists and up to her neck. With the rest of her ensemble, it looked like opaque black stockings and a tight, warm undershirt. Not too out of the ordinary for a trip offworld.

But holy shit, was it way beyond ordinary.

Roxy shoved the Migrant Catalyst between her breasts. With it safely stowed, she pulled the black slippers out of her purse, pulling them on over her feet and up to her knee. They were the same hi-tech weave as her suit. As were the long gloves she fought to get her fingers into.

“T-minus thirty, Rolal,” Timaeus reported dutifully.

Roxy opened her mouth to let the belt drift in the air near her face. “Don’t you worry, I got this! The fuckin’ gloves are just… not made to size, oh my god.”

“Bring it up with your contractor. And I’m not worried.”

“Bullshit, you aren’t. But you really don’t gotta worry, I’m good.” She finished dragging the gloves on, lashing them down with their straps. It was like velcro. Space velcro. Roxy snickered, and grabbed one of the Alternian space helmets. The opening was wide, built to accommodate troll horns. It left a dangerous gap; Roxy pushed her belt into the space and pressed a button in the buckle. The belt expanded like a balloon snake, filling the gap and making a seal.

“Okay,” Roxy said slowly. “Alrighty then.” Grabbing a handle against the wall, she turned, facing the airlock. Beyond it was the glowing green-blue of Earth. “Okay. Awesome. Shit.”

Bless his fucking heart, Timaeus just asked, “Is the Catalyst secure?”

“Tucked up in Victoria’s Secret compartment,” Roxy chirped back, pouring as much cheerfulness as she could into it.

By now, her purse was empty of all of its wonderful toys. She unzipped it all the way, until it opened flat, and unfolded the soft waxy material inside.

With her suit fully on, she felt like the marshmallow man, stiff and unable to reach very far. Getting her arms to go back far enough to drag the straps up to her shoulders was difficult, and Roxy nearly cracked and asked for her remaining time.

But she was a goddamn professional, and didn’t speak until the parachute was secure. “Time?”

“Five,” Timaeus said. “Four.”

“My fuckin eyebrow itches,” she told him gravely.

He continued to count down. “Three. Two. One.”

The airlock opened, and Roxy was hurled out into space.

For anyone else alive, this would have been a moment of pure existential terror as the pristine fatal vacuum closed around her.

Roxy pointed her toes and crossed her arms over her chest, thinking about carried momentum and drag.

“You’ll be out of range soon,” her partner in crime told her. “I’ll scrub out of the systems and disconnect right after.”

There was a pause, hung between them, across a hundred miles of distance. A hundred and change, maybe. Roxy beamed.

“I’ll send you a postcard, let you know how the rest of it went. But you’ll probably see it on the news first!”

“Christ,” Timaeus said, pained. “Fine. Try not to die becoming the first non-commercial LEO diver. Hate to lose my best customer.”

“Your concern is touching as always. Anyway. See ya, Tima,” Roxy sing-songed happily, and listened as the audiolink between them popped and fizzled into static, and then nothing.

She was on her way home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> listen [David Bowie's "Cat People (Putting Out Fire)"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50UhgiwcCc4) is the soul of the fic, i hope you are ready for some queer espionage and crime folks
> 
> This has been the Cold Open. Next chapter, we shall meet Jake, and kick this adventure off.
> 
> For the curious, the coda for TWYCC is still coming. Unfortunately the latest school shooting int he US happened very very close to my home, and I just can't write something joyful like that coda right now. But it will get wrapped up good and proper as soon as I can.
> 
> Anyway, I'm over on tumblr [@callmearcturus](https://callmearcturus.tumblr.com/). I think the tag for this fic is gonna be **#POFWG.**
> 
> OH AND SHOUTOUT TO MIMS FOR THE GODTIER CHAPTER TITLE SUGGESTION. The fact I didn't think of it, jfc. I should be fired.


	2. for your eyes only

The headline on the screen said: _Daredevil Performs Illegal Low Orbit Dive From Condessa’s Flagship._

Getting it down to that alone had been a feat. The concentrated effort of world governments trying to dial down the coverage of Rolal’s return to Earth. Somehow, several different angles of her descent were recorded, but no one knew where she went after. By the time police were scrambled to the scene, she had already finished signing a few autographs and leaving.

The autographs had been confiscated, of course. As were the shellphones and spectres with selfies.

“The fucking problem is the stupid fanclub. Only humans would create a fanclub around a criminal. Wow, she’s so cool, running around and stealing shit,” the information tech agent said sharply as his fingers flicked across one of his three keyboards. “Some asshole holds a teller at the corporate money repository at gunpoint and we all know that’s a shitty thing to do. But if they wear nice clothes and can do some sick flips, and suddenly they have a fan page with one hundred twenty thousand users.”

Jake English bit down a sigh, tucking his chin against his chest. Arguing with Sollux was not the most fruitful hobby, but everyone in MI6 understood it was necessary and chipped in. It wouldn’t do for Sollux to get bored, with a mind like a million steel- and -cybernetic traps. It could lead to him leaving, seeking out more engaging employment. Or it could lead him to cracking into the MI6 servers to rewrite them in weird Alternian code language. Both were bad.

Jake put a hand on the back of Sollux’s chair and squinted at the monitors, trying to pick out which one Sollux was currently working in. “Well, that sounds like a fib to me. Don’t trolls dig into the exploits of their ancestors and basically do the same thing to them?”

“Do I look like I indulge in high-blood hoofbeastshit?” Sollux snapped. “And a species with your familial structure doesn’t get to say anything about a fraction of my species electing to give a damn about direct lineage. Unless Rolal has a family of about one hundred twenty thousand, which seems unlikely. Just statistically.”

“Right. So, what are you working on?”

“What am _I_ doing? Well, English, I’m launching a campaign to dampen the splash of Rolal’s latest criminal offense before too many people catch on and some clickbait site blows this entire mess and incites an intergalactic incident.” Here, Sollux turned not just his head to acknowledge Jake’s hovering presence, but rotated his chair thirty degrees to fix Jake with a smidgen of direct glare. “Shouldn’t you be doing whatever field agents are supposed to be doing to contain it on your end?”

Jake stepped back, out of the meager path of Sollux’s visual range. As soon as the thread between them broke, Sollux pivoted back to face his array of monitors and got back to work.

Jake swallowed. “It’s not going to be such a tawdry scene, is it? Do you think it’s going to go off like that?”

“This is the second major interspecies crime against the Condessa this _month_ ,” Sollux said in that sort of exaggeratedly calm way that meant he thought Jake was an idiot for even asking that question. “If news breaks of the Migrant Catalyst getting stolen, you can bet your car, your salary, and your shitty hiveblock that the murder will be the next news item.”

Which would be bad. A scurrying panic broke over Jake’s skin, and he rubbed his arms. He let out a soft ‘brr’ noise, as if he were cold instead of freaked the sweet hell out. “Cold in here.”

“Go away now,” Sollux said.

“Of course,” Jake said, and high tailed it out of there.

Despite the tenor of the company, Jake liked it in the information lab. Sollux had a stick so far up his ass it could double as his spine, but the aura of general annoyance and meanness kept the lab quiet, as if everyone was afraid of inciting his rapier tongue if they so much as set their coffee mugs down too loudly.

Also there was that rumor he could shoot laser beams from his eyes. That probably helped too.

Outside the lab, the bullpen was as rowdy as the day before a grand old rodeo. Agents were conferring with their field support, going over data points, while some of the techs were projecting a world map onto the wall, interspersed with circles that represented some vital statistic on the active cases.

Jake wandered closer to get a look at the big illuminated board. It seemed to be cycling through the pertinent information every five seconds. A few spots were marked as the potential locations of black market fences, people who would be interested in rare Alternian artifacts, people Rolal might sell the Catalyst to. Others marked server points where Timaeus’ VOIP connection had routed through. And another remained fixated above Chicago, where John Egbert-Crocker had been killed.

Things did not look good for Earth honestly. Every agency from MI6 to Moussad to Spetsnaz to the CIA had been on high alert since Egbert had turned up dead in his own office at Egbert Advancements. It was like the death of an ambassador, the human married to the most wealthy and powerful terran-bound Alternian.

Nothing about it made sense, least of all the killer. Timaeus had never killed someone before, was almost infamous for keeping his clients from resorting to lethal force. That he ended that lovely trend with Egbert was water cooler talk for a solid two weeks.

Now… things were a great deal worse.

The Condessa was being attacked. Surely, she was a whopper of a target, being _the_ more famous Alternian on the planet. But this marked the first serious interspecies crime. The fishqueen had been understandably vexed by the whole thing and it would be an interplanetary incident on the level of Archduke Ferdinand if it got back to Alternia proper.

But so far she’d been willing to keep things hushed and let humanity try to repair things.

For all the fucking good it was doing so far.

While Jake stood there, taking in all the distilled knowledge in MI6, he staggered as someone bumped into his shoulder in their haste to get past him, to the little squad of people standing around the console, arm extended with more paperwork, more data.

“The dirt from America, they’ve done the groundwork eliminating some of the options.”

“Unless your source is lying. We’ll have to double check it.”

“My source is _fine_ , we can’t waste this time.”

“Sure. You can go pitch that to A, that your yank pal is just really generous.”

Jake walked away, out of earshot.

That was the thing. Whoever brought in Timaeus or Rolal was going to win all the glory and kudos from the Condessa. And, more importantly to Jake, whoever managed _that_ would be… knighted or something. Jake wasn’t sure what the reward was for this, but knew it was going to be more than the honor to queen and country.

Hell, he wasn’t even British. But being the hero of the day sure had its appeals.

If other agents were leveraging their connections, there was no reason Jake shouldn’t either.

He grabbed his jacket and left, employing every ounce of subtlety that had been drilled into him all these years.

No one noticed him go; he hoped it was because the aforementioned subtlety, but suspected that was wishful thinking on his part.

 

* * *

 

Jake English was the grandson of a woman named Jade English, who was one of the most decorated people to ever work for Interpol. Once upon a time, she had been Jade Harley.

When he was a teenager, Jake had asked her why the name change. According to her, she’d had trouble getting the agency to take her seriously, since she was an immigrant from an island in the South Pacific, a “foreigner” to their reckoning. As a joke, she changed her name to English. It was the most ostentatious way she could think of to bite her thumb at them all, while crouching it in enough humor to not get disciplined somehow.

The next week, she brought in the notorious kingpin Broderick Strider, her big break, the high profile case that cemented her place in Interpol’s history.

After every news site in the world ran stories about Jade _English_ , changing it back to Harley wasn’t really an option. Besides, it seemed to be good luck, didn’t it?

Jake like the moniker most days. A fellow living in London with the name “English” without the accent to match threw people for a loop de loop, which was fairly enjoyable.

The people who sneered at him and muttered about famous last names and nepotism, less so.

He couldn’t decide if using his Gran’s old credentials to take a look-see at Interpol’s progress on the situation was ironic or some righteous retribution or just proving everyone right. But it wouldn’t matter if it _worked_ , now, would it?

There was a black out house a few blocks away, an internet cafe with dozens of VPNs ready to go and mask communications. When Jake arrived, he could see a solid third of the patrons in the building were other agents from MI6. Also, one woman he suspected of being Moussad? But he couldn’t be certain without a sustained glance, and meeting each others’ eyes in this place was terribly rude.

Instead, he grabbed a computer, leaning in close to the monitor and tilting the screen until he could fool himself into assuming no one would see what he was doing. Opening a private session, he plugged in the IP address that served as the Interpol detectives’ portal into their files while off premises.

His Gran’s username and password got him in with no problem. It paid to be a big name at the agency.

As soon as he was logged in, he could see the usual Blue Notice that was associated with Timaeus was elevated to a Red Notice. Right under it sat a blue one for Rolal.

Jake clicked around, looking at what was in the debriefs. Most of them were fluff, or at least just repeating what he already knew from MI6.

In Gran’s inbox were a plethora of missives. All of them were greyed out, having already been clicked. Jake smiled to himself; his grandmother was supposed to be long retired by now, but the fact she was still keeping up on the business didn’t surprise Jake in the slightest. Old folks did love their mysteries. Gran just preferred the true crime stuff over what was on TV.

He read everything that had arrived in her inbox in the past month. Then, he did a search for a few keywords and read everything in the past two years on Timaeus, on his suspected clients, on what was known about his methods, and on potential whereabouts.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t substantially more than Jake already knew: Timaeus was a self-proclaimed Mastermind For Hire who was essentially a criminal contractor. He responded to requests through the right channels and for a hefty fee orchestrated robberies and thefts. Unfortunately the ‘channels’ changed every other week, it seemed, and no one was certain how to get in touch with him.

The two chumps who’d murdered John Egbert were outliers. After they’d been picked up by the CIA, they cheerfully broke their contract with Timaeus to spill all the details, pegging him for the hit job.

Jake hoped for more. Some kind of lead would go down a treat right now. But Interpol was in the same state that MI6 was in, dragging people off leave, all hands on deck, conjecture and frantic action.

Holding back a sulk, Jake wiped his activity from the computer and signed out. Well, that was useless. At this rate, the only way he’d make any progress would be to actually beat his feet on the streets. And even in that case, where did you even _start_?

He’d start tomorrow. Somehow. Packing up, Jake left a large bill in the tip jar and left, stepping back out onto the street with his hands shoved in his pockets.

 

* * *

 

The trip home was uneventful. It was good practice to pay for day tickets when using the Underground. Avoiding paper trails and all that. But Jake had yet to even get a field mission since being approved for duty, and until then, he’d stick to his Oyster card. There was hardly any trail to follow with him, honestly; heavens to Betsy, someone might realize this tram card was linked to the same credit line as a Netflix account and an Amazon.uk account filled with frivolous wishlists! He had the good sense to pay his rent in cash and route his more serious purchases through the quartermaster, and that was enough due diligence for him, thanks much.

The train car rocked gently as he flicked his thumb across his phone screen, linking up colorful dots and enjoying the sounds they made as they popped and new ones dropped into place. In his peripherals, he tracked the other passengers, but no one came at him with a knife or a syringe or anything, and eventually he got off at his stop and headed home.

A lingering guilt followed him back to his building. Surely Sollux was still working. Surely a majority of the agency would be working triple shifts, surviving on strong coffee and energy drinks as they hunted their quarry.

Well, Jake would join them. But tomorrow. After a very good night sleep, he would be right in the thick of it with the best of them.

For all the good it would do.

Quietly, in the back of his head, he wondered if A _had_ elevated him to field agent just because his Gran. She’d never seemed the type, but… there was no way to know for sure. Especially with A, honestly; since she’d become the first Alternian head of MI6, things had been shaken up like a cocktail mixer. No one quite knew what to make of it, of her.

That lingering guilt was dogging his steps now. He stared at his shoes as he reached his flat, shaking out his key from his pocket. It slid into the lock and the door opened easily.

The toothpick he left to mark the door was missing.

Jake reached into his coat stand and extracted the silenced USP he kept stashed amid the jackets. Leaving the lights off, he crept forward on silent feet.

His place was not particularly large, and no thugs seemed to be hiding in his closet or behind the sofa or against his dresser. It was quiet, undisturbed but for the obvious sign someone had been here.

Even if he didn’t know what was going on, he needed to report the intrusion. Once Jake finished clearing rooms, he hurried back to his kitchen, which had the best cover and the best vantage point in the apartment.

He has the number punched in, ready to go, when his eyes fell on his counter, and he stopped.

The toothpick was sitting there, perfectly perpendicular to the edge. And immaculately parallel to the toothpick was a sheet of plain A4 paper.

Finger resting against the trigger guard, Jake used his free hand to drag the paper closer, _really_ hoping it didn’t say anything like “Hasta la vista, baby” or “This message will self-destruct in an absurdly short amount of time,” or whatever.

Thankfully, it didn’t.

It said:

> If you want to play the game, you’re going to need to get your hands dirty. Grandma’s old logins aren’t getting you a place on the board.
> 
> But you already knew that.
> 
> If you ever want to be known as something other than Jade English’s grandkid, I can help. Pick up a package at Westcliffe Storage, tomorrow before noon. Locker 6368.

The paper was not signed. The font was a neat sans-serif. Verdana maybe.

Taped to the bottom of the sheet was a plain metal key.

Jake put his phone down and peeled the key off the page, wincing as it tore, the sound deafening in his otherwise silent apartment. It fit between to fingers easily. He turned it over, looking for any signs of fingerprints or tarnish or anything useful. It was pristine.

Well. So much for a relaxing evening.

 

* * *

 

Standard operating procedure for a break in was to immediately contact MI6, to call for a sweep team to look for clues, and to move to a safe house for the night.

Instead, Jake watched whatever was in his queue until he fell asleep on his sofa, key clutched in one hand, handgun on the coffee table.

Westcliffe Storage opened at 8AM. Jake set his alarm for 7 and was there by 7:30.

The shop was long and narrow, squeezed into long row of stores on a sideroad just off a moderately busy street. Jake tried to keep his head down as he walked in, checking his corners for any camera. A hat pulled low over his head would block him from recognition _if_ he could sort out the angles, but as the devil would have it, there were no little black glass spheres shoved into the walls or ceiling.

There was just a teenager sitting on a stool behind a counter, blocked off with a plane of bulletproof glass. She had one of those newfangled gaming consoles propped up in front of her, her eyes steady on the screen.

As he walked by, she spared him only the slightest glance before her attention returned to her game.

He sure hoped she wasn’t a plant from the agency, here to test just how far afield he’d go. That’d ruin him.

But the lure of the letter and its promise pulled him along anyway. He half expected to run into another covert coworker here, like at the internet cafe. But the place was empty besides the attendant.

Sucking in a breath, Jake hurried down the line. Each locker was small, like little metal shoeboxes with padlocks on. Many had locks sitting and waiting. Others had their door swung open, vacant and waiting for some kind of contraband.

6368 was halfway down the long tunnel of boxes.

Jake shoved his key in and yanked it open, wincing as the door banged into another open door adjacent.

Inside was a box, a small clamshell hinge. A ring box.

He grabbed it, pocketed it, and shut the door again.

“Bring me the lock and key please, thanks,” the attendant said in a bored voice.

“Right, ‘course,” Jake said, and hurried back to her. There was a small divot under her window, just large enough to put the lock and key in. He surreptitiously rubbed both down with his shirt before handing them off.

There was a pause as the girl seemed to get to a stopping point in her digital adventure. She put one control stick down, the blue one, and picked up the lock. Clicking it shut and shoving the key in, she hung both up on the wall behind her.

When she was done, she glanced up at Jake and frowned. “Uh, _bye_?”

“Bye, have a nice day,” Jake chirped, and scuttled his ass out of there as fast as he could without breaking into a sprint.

As soon as he was outside, Jake weaved around for a while. Two blocks east, cutting through an alley, walking one block south, turning west for a while. He didn’t stop until he’d doubled back on his own route thrice, checking for anyone dogging his steps.

Miraculously, he seemed to be alone.

He put one hand in his pocket and opened the ring box. Inside was a solid, single piece, about the size of his thumb. He pinched it and pulled it out.

It was an earpiece. A crescent hook with a nodule jutting into the middle, made of smooth white plastic with a pleasant matte surface.

Jake’s final thought before hooking it on his ear was: _sweet beguiling fuck, I hope this doesn’t get me killed._

The earpiece fit perfectly, tucking in on the first try.

There was no static pop, no sense of the device coming online. It just spoke in a low baritone, the sound so crisp he could hear the inhale of breath as if someone had their lips against his ear.

“Given your profile, I expected you’d keep me waiting longer than that. You must be more desperate than I thought. Desperation is good for business.”

Jake swallowed against the nervous lump in his throat. Timaeus had a file on him. Timaeus knew where he lived. Timaeus had a voice like bourbon, dark and molasses sweet.

He was relieved when his voice came out steady enough. “Is this a joke?”

“No,” Timaeus said curtly. “It’s a mutually beneficial proposition. You need a thief. I need a fed. There’s a coffee shop two blocks down, on your left. Go and have a drink. Let’s talk.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the heavy exposition in this one. It's what I get for doing a flashy cold open without any.
> 
> Oh and I got a new job! Yaaaaay. /thumbs up


	3. should you choose to accept it

For the entire four minutes and forty seconds it took for Jake to reach the coffee shop, his mind was a whirling dervish.

Was there a way he could signal for backup? Not that he wasn’t quite confident in his own abilities, thanks much, but this was _Timaeus_. He’d been on most wanted lists across the globe for five years and counting, since he’d made his big splash in Kyoto helping a local small time crime syndicate knock over a private casino. The syndicate had been taken down in about two years, but no one ever got a trace on Timaeus.

Call Jake a coward or a pragmatist, but he was worried about how to pull this off. Especially given how he could make his career in his first real mission today if he played his cards right.

Hell’s bells and demonic choirs, why not just take him out on sight? Sure, it would scandalize the other patrons of the cafe but they’d see it on the news that evening! It’d be a tale to tell later; they’d gotten to see the great mastermind unmasked. And by a handsome MI6 agent who was not so much green as gold. It’d be fantastic honestly. He’d be jealous.

These were not calming thoughts. It was this kind of daydreaming that nearly cost him his certifications. As Jake reached out to push the door open, letting himself into the coffee shop, he packed it all away and focused. This was it.

It wasn’t, as it turned out.

Of course it wasn’t, and he was a fool for thinking it would be. He wasn’t walking into here to play his metaphorical royal flush and win the day. He was sitting down at a little round table in the furthest corner he could, best vantage on the windows and exits and bathrooms.

No, not a hot shot at a poker table. More a hapless wanderer sat before a tarot seer, watching nothing but bad flipped up for him. Like… Death and the Doomed Rookie and whatever else meant misfortune in that queer little game.

“You should get a drink, Agent English,” Timaeus said in his ear. “It’s rude to plant yourself down in these places without buying something.”

It didn’t sound so much like a friendly suggestion as an order. Also, Gran raised Jake better than being a wifi leech.

So he got up, ordered a drink, and quickly returned to his seat.

There were… students around him. A lot of Shellbooks with their clamshell-style chassis and pink ambient glow. Jake knew from Sollux that any hacker would rather be without a computer than with one of those. A few older folks with actual paper books in hand. All too old for Timaeus’ profile.

Jake inhaled deeply, blowing over the rim of his mug as he looked around. The fellow in the opposite corner was going to give himself a hunch leaning over his notebook like that. The sharp dressed troll at the counter was clearly late to a meeting; she’d checked her watch five times in the last minute.

No one was looking at Jake. And further, no one was looking through the reflection of the windows or the shiny Shellbooks at him either; he carefully checked.

In his ear, there was a soft huff, a distant cousin to a laugh. It still had the eerie too-real quality to it, like someone was leaning in close. “English Breakfast? Really? Is that a joke?”

“It’s a strong start to a good morning,” Jake replied sharply. And yes, the name amused him. He took care not to move his lips much as he said, “You’re not coming, are you.”

Timaeus was silent for a beat. “Did you think I was?”

Jake slurped some tea loudly, hoping the sound was _awful_ down the line with its conspicuous high fidelity. “What do you want?” Now, his gaze went beyond the windows, wondering if any of the cars parked outside held Timaeus.

“Stop looking, it’s embarrassing,” Timaeus said. “There isn’t an unmarked black van with a conspicuous dish on the roof idling in an alleyway. And this kind of place isn’t really my scene. I’m a professional, English. Also, I don’t get out of the country much.”

Jake indulged in a pissed frown as he glared down at the table, for lack of person to stare daggers at. “And yet you know my drink order and my relative location?” He tipped his head back, searching for-- there, above the till, a camera hung down.

“Relax, agent.”

“Start talking or I’ll start walking.”

“Don’t go to Vegas with bluffs like that. Or, what do you have in merry old England? Blackpool?”

“Hardly,” Jake said, acidly. “Out with it.”

“I can tell you’ll be a joy to work with,” Timaeus said crisply. Jake’s eyes widened. “That’s _if_ we work together. Right now you’re flunking this job interview.”

“I would have put on some air of politesse if I’d _known_ it was an interview,” Jake hissed. “What are you on about? People hire you, not the other way ‘round.”

“I could fill several terabytes with all the shit you don’t know about me, English.” He took an audible breath. “But alright. We each have something the other wants. I’m proposing an exchange of services.”

All Jake wanted was Timaeus, and he doubted that was part of the terms. Still: “I’m listening.”

“I’m putting together a crew for a heist. I require one more warm body to round out the mission. Having a spy would benefit the endeavor incalculably.”

“Why,” Jake said.

“Let me pitch it to you like this. Jake English, well known scion of a very good intelligence agent, goes dark abruptly in the middle of an agency-wide red alert. He reappears somewhere else, undercover with no outside contact. How do you think any prying eyes would react?”

It didn’t take much thought. “Half the agency is doing much the same right now,” he murmured. “They’d go out of their way not to interfere or reach out to me.”

“Agreed. And thus this little heist which might not otherwise get off the ground will go off without a hitch, given the relative lack of nosy double-ohs trying to get in on it.”

Knowing Timaeus could see him, Jake grinned, showing his teeth. He’d been told many times he had a good smile. “And why in the sam hell would I do this?”

“Because when I run a job, everyone gets paid.”

“I don’t want money.”

“Obviously. But how’s this for payment:” He paused, for effect most likely. “Rolal.”

Jake felt himself color, and the breath he sucked in was probably crystal clear across the mic. Oh, if he could bring in the woman who had taken the Migrant Catalyst… It would not be quite as pretty a parcel as Timaeus himself, but it was _damn well close._

He stamped down his excitement like campfire coals. There was no way this would happen. Jake sighed, and said, “Horseshit.”

Like he was ready for that, Timaeus said, “Elaborate.”

Jake tapped his index finger against the side of his mug. “She’s never been apprehended before. For all I know, you’d hand over a poor trussed up blonde chica verde and amscray before I know the difference.” He tapped his middle finger along with the other. “Rolal is listed as one of your most common conspirators, across almost a dozen different incidents.” His thumb counted three with another tap against the mug. “And not to cast doubts on your abilities, sir, but I don’t think you could get her any more easily than we could. No offense.”

He held up his hand, aiming the fingergun briefly at the register camera and closed one eye, like looking down sights. Lowering it, he took another sip of his tea, now perfectly warm and no longer scalding. “Not interested.”

“Bold move, negotiating payment at first interview,” Timaeus nearly fucking purred, sounding pleased. “But all valid concerns.”

“Thanks,” Jake said. “Not just a pretty face.”

“Not just,” he said, and Jake nearly choked on his tea. “But yeah, I’ve worked with Rolal for years. She’s a phenomenal thief, and when I have the time to book her, I do. As would anyone if they could. She’d likely say the same-- she’s commissioned me for my oversight more times than you know. And I mean that literally; plenty of our jobs never made it across your desk.

“However,” Timaeus said, and then paused with the first moment of real hesitation you’d heard from him. “This job is different. And it’s nothing personal. She’d know that. We’re professionals. By now she feels some trust-among-thieves shit towards me, doubtlessly. It’s her own fault if it winds up being her downfall.”

Jake frowned. “That’s cold.”

“Don’t really care about the moral judgements of one of her Majesty’s prized gunhands. But anyway. Do this job for me, and you’ll walk away with Rolal. I’ll even truss her up, if that’s your fetish.”

Jake’s teeth hurt from the clench of his jaw. “And how will you do that?”

“What, isn’t it obvious?” Timaeus asked coolly. “She’s on the same job.”

Timaeus and Rolal were collaborating again. Not a week after their last stunt, they were working together again. And Timaeus was recruiting Jake for the same job.

Jake could feel the rush of adrenaline in his veins all at once. He pressed his hand flat to the table and breathed.

“Yeah,” Timaeus said, smug. “Keep it in your pants, English. But that’s the deal. You go dark-- and I mean dark the moment you stand up to leave-- and let me puppet you through this little job. You play your part and throw off the gaze of the intelligence community, and I’ll give you Rolal when the job is finished.” Something like steel entered his voice. “But if you make a play for her before I say, if you so much as sneeze in the general direction of London, I will string you up and leave you to bleed out.”

Jake’s eyes narrowed. “Is that a pun? The string you up thing?”

“Maybe. Are you in or out?”

The answer was clinging to the tip of Jake’s tongue. It was a great effort not to leap into this immediately. The rush in his blood was making his knee bounce, anxious to be seated when he wanted to… to run around and yell or whatever it took to spend the energy. Jake swallowed and asked, “What if I’m out?”

“You’re not out,” Timaeus said almost kindly.

He wasn’t. Fuck. “Fine then. I’m in.” He lifted his mug and finished the last of his tea in two mouthfuls. “Aim and ignite.”

 

* * *

 

When Jake left the coffee shop to put his affairs in order--

Wait, that sounded horrible. Like he was going to his certain doom, or something. He was not. Jake was doing this for Queen and Country and, frankly, _Humanity_.

The exhilaration had not yet left him. He was sold on this job with the payment of Rolal herself. But, as Jake walked back to his apartment, he could only think of the opportunity this presented. To his knowledge, no white hat had ever spent any extended amount of time with Timaeus. Even if Timaeus would be directing Jake remotely, there was a _chance_ he could learn enough to nail Timaeus too.

Just the possibility lit up Jake’s mind like a charge through neon gas.

The earpiece remained nestled in Jake’s ear. It was quiet again, had been since Timaeus had left him with his first set of instructions. Still, it felt like a spider lurking against Jake’s skin, and he tried to keep calm, trying not to agitate it any way, lest it bite him.

Arriving home, Jake got to work.

First, he took a hammer out of the toolbox he kept under his bed, and dragged it along the wall behind his television, counting out four steps. There, he stopped, and slammed the hammer into it.

It cracked the pale blue drywall like an eggshell. He caught the hammer head against the fractures, pulling them wider, not wanting to make more noise than needed.

Beyond the hole he made was a black box, mounted inside and lurking. The core of the monitoring in his apartment. There were mics in his lamps, in his plants, motion sensors concealed strategically around the entire place. He didn’t remember where all of the damn things were, so best just take out the brain they all fed to.

He lifted the device off the wall, put it in a pillowcase, and hit it a few times with the hammer, then dumped it in the sink and ran cold water over it for five minutes.

That done, Jake took out his phone, already mourning his high scores in his dots game. But it couldn’t be helped; he turned it off, and opened his safe, stashing the reliable old spectre inside.

Next to it, still fresh in the box, was another phone. It was a newer model, a little too fancy for his tastes. But it was clean. He took that one, and shut the safe. The lining would prevent anyone accessing his old phone. Good enough for now.

Turning the new phone on, it sang its spooky little tune at him, flashing the smiling ghost emblem as it booted. Jake spared a thought to the late Mr. Egbert; he sure knew how to design a friendly little device. Much better than his wife’s sparkly, obnoxious shellphones.

There was no sign of the return of Timaeus’ attention. Just the surprise when he spoke: “Connect that phone to your laptop.”

Jake thought about protesting, but… this was the deal, wasn’t it? To purloin Timaeus’ own words, the fellow was his puppetmaster now.

Taking out a clean cable from his table drawer, Jake plugged in the phone.

He turned away, already thinking of his next task. Timaeus coughed. “Data mode, please.”

“Right, sorry,” Jake said, and thumbed on the screen, changing the setting. Then he frowned. “Wait, couldn’t you just…”

“Testing you. Good compliance with orders. Go finish getting ready now.”

Jake rolled his eyes, secure in the knowledge only Timaeus could be watching, and he didn’t mind letting him know what Jake thought of his posturing.

There was a mental checklist in Jake’s mind, and he drew a dark line through each item as he worked.  He stripped, down to his skin, dropping all his old clothes in a pile at the foot of his closet. Gooseflesh spread over his skin from the chill in the air, and he slapped at his arms irritably.

He had a fresh set ready to go in a sealed bag. The plastic was opaque black, and he forgot what the hell he’d put in there.

Dark brown shorts with a lot of pockets, a plain tee, and a nice heavy jacket. And boxers, of course. He pulled those on first, covering up before asking, “Where am I going? Do I need a coat?”

He’d disabled the surveillance in his apartment, but still wondered if Timaeus was watching somehow. The laptop was in the other room… but Jake had tape over the lens, so probably not.

“You’ll find out later.”

Jake dressed, and pulled on the jacket, just in case. He could always abandon it later. “Shelly, what’s the weather at my destination?” he asked in a cheery voice.

Timaeus sighed, deep and heartfelt. “Oh, the AI joke. I’ve never heard that before.”

His annoyance sounded so genuine, Jake winced. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine.”

Jake finished changing and looked at the travel bags he kept under his bed. He gnawed at his lip, thinking. It was early in this, and he didn’t want to mess anything up so soon before he even had a lead to follow. “Timaeus,” he called, trying not to feel strange talking to the air.

“Trying to decide which bag to take? I assume you have one hot and one completely clean.”

“You _did_ say you wanted my presence on this job to be of some record, to throw off potential interference.”

“I did. But if you only go _partially_ dark, it might skew my predictions for how this will work. When MI6 discovers you went dark, they will seek you out, and it’ll take them time to pinpoint you. That’s also resources redirected away from their other projects.”

“Clean bag it is,” Jake said in easy concession. Having a tracker with him wouldn’t be _that_ much of a boon anyway; if he absolutely had to, he’d be able to signal to his MI6 later.

Hopefully. Jake looked at the bags, then looked back towards the living room. Did Timaeus…

It didn’t matter. Jake dug out his box of passports. “Which country am I going to?”

“English,” Timaeus said, chiding again.

“Trying to pick an identity, thank you.”

“Fine. America. As if that wasn’t perfectly evident.”

He didn’t have to be an ass about it, Jake thought sourly, and plucked up a little book, then pulling out the matching driver’s license from a rubberbanded stack. “Well, hello there, the name’s Jacob Harley,” he tried out loud. Hm, no. There was a little too much RP lingering around his vowels. Licking his lips, he tried again. “Howdy, I’m Jake Harley, pleased t’meet you.”

His voice settled into a moderately Midwestern American drawl. Perfect.

“Wow. Okay,” Timaeus opined quietly. “Do you take requests?”

“ _Pas pour les fripouilles de votre genre_ ,” Jake said, flipping seamlessly to French, grinning. The passport and ID tucked away, he shouldered the bag and walked out to the living room. “Are you about done with that?”

“Ninety seconds.” A pause. “That’s a decent trick. If you ever wanted to go rogue, we could find work for you.”

“Noted,” Jake said, because he was polite. When he leaned to look, a bootloader dominated his phone’s screen. Fine. He looked around, hoping he wasn’t forgetting anything.

There was a legal pad sitting on his coffee table. It would be nice to leave a note, in case his Gran worried. But Timaeus would likely veto that; retired or not, she _was_ Interpol.

Timaeus was right. He’d be found. It was in fact part of the plan.

Jake lost himself in thought, percolating over _what ifs_ until Timaeus said the phone was finished. He unplugged it and looked it over as it restarted.

The amicable ghost theme was gone. Instead, it loaded an entirely different interface, all honey golds and white-on-dark text. A splash screen declared it TimaeOS.

“Really?” Jake asked, unable to stop himself as he looked over the changes.

“Yes,” Timaeus said without further remark. “If you’re ready, head for the airport.”

The phone flipped itself to the web browser, and opened a page with a QR code and a flight number. No further details.

“I assume you can manage on your own for a while,” he told Jake in a flat voice. “Play nice and I’ll see you in about twelve hours.”

“So, O’Hare,” Jake said.

There was no answer. For once, he didn’t rise to the bait.

Jake felt… strange. There was no doubt Timaeus was monitoring him somehow, but finally the silence in his ears stretched its legs and settled in, relieved in the absence of the mysterious voice.

The permeable privacy that surrounded Jake was nice. Finally he could turn all this over.

And it was… exciting. The feeling was overwhelming and impossible to ignore. This was, in a sense, his first real assignment, albeit from a criminal entity and not the Queen Mother or what have you. But the scope of what he was setting out to do was almost intoxicating.

Jake was going dark to work a job for the most wanted man in the world.

As he locked up behind himself-- not bothering with the toothpick, someone would be along anyway-- he found himself grinning.  


* * *

 

Fingers pressed against a hotkey on the keyboard, and a bright clear mute symbol appeared across the monitor on the screen. The waveform adjacent to it kept moving, following the soft sound of Jake English’s breathing, but for his part, Timaeus was safe.

Safe to learn forward on his hands. His thumbs pressed up against the bottom of his frames, pushing them up into his hair. Clear, his fingertips ran over the bridge of his nose, dragging his nails up along his skin where it felt strained.

He’d been at this desk for almost a solid day now, getting everything together. The time right before a job was the worst. All the preparations had to be done with precision, or the fucking thing would spin out like a liquored up top later on.

Especially this time. He didn’t want to think directly about what was to come. What he was going to do. Betrayal was not normally in his list of services.

But shit was different now, wasn’t it? The _world_ was different in the wake of Egbert. And Timaeus had to adapt.

Speaking of. Before he could take off and go stand under the hottest shower known to human- and trollkind, he had to set the other part of this plan on its way.

After listening to Jake for a while to assure English was following instruction-- and jesus, he was really good at that, wasn’t he? Normally people were more resistant to taking orders from the jump, but this secret agent man took to it like a preternaturally obedient fish to water.

After Timaeus was sure it was fine and English was sticking to the script, he reached out and unmuted one of the other active lines on his monitor.

She was humming to herself. At this hour, it was probably in the middle of her exercise routine. Yoga or stretches, perhaps, given the lack of stress in her voice.

“Rolal,” he said, and she went quiet, instantly alert.

“Yeah?” She breathed. “Update?”

“Head for the safehouse in Chicago. The job’s a go. I have your partner en route.”

“Aw yes,” Rolal said, clearly pleased. “Later, Tima.”

With another strike of a key, he went muted again, and reached back to stretch out his arms and back.

There was not a lot of time. Setting his suite to standby, he got up, and went for that shower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have a full time job now.
> 
> and yet, apparently i can still write pretty briskly. so thank god.
> 
> i can't remember the last time i wrote this much dialogue. it's pretty fun. 8)


	4. (counter) leverage

Jake English arrived in Chicago with just a duffle bag to his name. Which wasn’t even his name, come to think of it.

After his long flight to the States and his trudge through customs, Jake navigated the ever-changing walls of O’Hare. It’d been some time since he’d been, and now there were gleaming rainbow lights casting up along the walls as he stood on the moving walkway. It was a dreary display, like a discount Blade Runner sendup for the modern era. Cyber without the punk.

He wrinkled his nose and turned his phone on, leaving his bag at his feet as he let the path carry him along.

The amber screen came on quickly, skipping the usual video of spooky technomancy that the spectre brand was preloaded with, just giving him the home screen in three seconds flat. As he tried to pull up the weather, an app opened instead, taking over the top half of the screen: a map, leading from O’Hare towards the lakeside districts. The bottom half was a completely different app, the CTA’s official fare manager. Jake apparently had an unlimited card ready to go.

Jake read the map, memorized the routes he was expected to take, then swiped them away and pulled up the weather at last. Chilly, like always. Chicago was always cold outside the summer months; the urban canyon wind alone was strong enough to carry a small child airbourne. He was just lucky it wasn’t raining.

He was going to do a job in this city. Jake breathed in deep, sighing it out slow before he bent to pick up his bag and start walking with the strange treadmill floor. Everything was moving faster now.

Taking the Blue Line to the Loop, Jake descended into one of the most upscale areas of the city. It was simultaneously the tourist area, with sites to see and massive glitzy shopping centers, and also strictly business, with most pedestrians in high heels and suits and carrying briefcases. It was perfect to melt into.

Today, the wind was rolling in with the cross streets, and Jake struggled to not curl up in his jacket as he was sliced by razor wind every block.

Eventually, he passed what he assumed to be a rather large point of interest.

Sitting right off the Mag Mile was Egbert Advancements. It stood out among its other glass-faced brethren with its mix of green and blue glass planes. It was a punch of color among the mirrored skyscrapers; as Jake walked by, a few green panels turned blue and vice versa, rippling like a pool of blue emerald, shifting with the flow of people walking by it. Most people ignored the ostentatious display, but a few backpackers took pictures and video of the building.

If there had been a memorial showing for Egbert, it was cleared away by now. Jake didn’t know if Egbert was the type to invite that kind of public reaction to his death. Especially given how little was known to the public about the whole affair.

He walked by, trying not to look too closely at the place.

On foot, his destination was a fair grip of foot travel away, where the overpriced ramen shops and giant museums faded out, the lake view vanishing behind the forest of architecture. Eventually, Jake departed from Michigan Avenue in all of its glory and cut into the whistling wind.

A few blocks down, he thankfully cut into a north-south crossway again, which was inexplicably lined with little houses. Brownstone townhouses, but with more grey and slate rock than actual _brown_.

He checked his phone and felt his heart skip. This was it. It was presumably Timaeus’ safehouse.

“Least it’s not a dockside warehouse,” Jake muttered.

“We can afford to be a little more classy than that,” Timaeus abruptly told him, jarring after half a day of silence. “I hope you’re not disappointed.”

“It’s just significantly less seedy than anticipated,” Jake told him.

“This area has been fully swallowed by the gentrifying force of the nearby suits and ties all wanting townhomes in walking distance to their high rises. I could have stationed you off a port with concrete floors and cots, no heating.”

“I’d probably feel better about working with criminals.”

“Too bad. I prefer someplace with fiber optic. Now go introduce yourself.”

His destination was the townhouse near the end of the street. It looked exactly like its neighbors in that typically cookie-cutter way, with only the presence of chained bikes and the contents of window boxes setting a few apart.

Timaeus’ had an herb garden in his window box. Utilitarian.

Ascending the steps, Jake reached out to try the knob. Locked.

“Remember,” Timaeus said. “If you breathe a word of our arrangement, it’s off.”

Jake didn’t have the chance to agree; the door swung open in front of him.

Rolal stood there on the other side. She was devoid of her gear or mask or dazzle makeup. Here, she was round-faced with a million kilowatt smile and a Hello Kitty shirt and cut-offs that were deeply unseasonal. As she let the door out of her grip, she gasped loudly and clapped both hands over her mouth. ”Tima,” she said in a breathy voice. “You didn’t say he was a cutie! You never get me cuties!”

As Jake’s face flushed in surprise, she touched her ear with two fingers, twisting. Resettling her earpiece, maybe. “Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Hey! Hi!” She leaned out to extend her hand, feet curled over the edge of the entryway, avoiding touching the outside with her bare feet. “You must be Jake Harley. I’m Rolal. Nice t’meet ya.”

Jake took her hand and gave it a firm shake. “Likewise. I’ve heard only great things.”

“You must not be hearin’ much at all then,” Rolal said cheerfully, keeping hold of his hand and pulling. Jake followed, into the house. “Welcome, welcome, come in, check out the digs, put your bag down.”

“Tima?” Jake asked, whisked inside. After preparing himself for the high tension of an arranged gig with ne’er-do-wells like these, the effervescence caught him off guard.

“Don’t,” Timaeus said curtly. Rolal must’ve heard it too because she cackled.

“Yeah, uh, he don’t like the familiarity, so don’t call him that maybe. I only get away with it because he needs me,” she said with a wink, patting Jake’s arm and giving his bicep a squeeze.

She froze in place, her eyes slipping away. Listening. After a few seconds, she rolled her eyes and met Jake’s again. “Sorry, what was I sayin’? Don’t look like that, you’re gonna have to get _real used_ to that. Until we wrap this job up and flee the city like it’s 1871, he’ll be gabbin’ at us all the time.”

“Right,” Jake said slowly. “You were saying about the digs?”

“Yes! Lemme give you the tour.”

It was a more obvious center of operations from the inside. There was just something about the stage room quality of the furniture layout, how the chairs were laid out to keep the door in view, and the black out coating on the windows.

The house was spartan in decor, but well stocked both in dry foods and in equipment, the former neatly arranged in the kitchen with only the milk and the cereal box out of place. The latter Rolal shows Jake, pointing out an alcove under the stairs that hid a small room in the blank space of the floor plan. There were small arms, perfectly coiled black ropes, powered winches and, weirdly, one long sheathed sword set centerpiece on the work table.

The rest was a pretty average dwelling. Two bedrooms upstairs at opposite ends of the hall had industrial bolts on the doors. There was a roof access point that Jake was pretty sure didn’t come standard in these sorts of homes. The bathroom had a medical cabinet better stocked than some ambulances. And, of course, there was security in every room, sensor and cameras alike. Probably more that Jake didn’t immediately spot. Very sparse, narrow blind spots.

“I got the left room,” Rolal told him, tapping her knuckles against the door. “Faces the sun, and I like waking up to do my stretches early.”

“It’s nicer than I expected,” Jake said.

“There’s also, like… so much food nearby,” Rolal gushed. “We’re right by the Loop, and that’s like gourmet chowtown.”

“If you’re done, we have to discuss the job,” Timaeus inserted before she could go on. Her face fell dramatically. “Put the receiver into the TV downstairs.”

“Fine,” Rolal said. “But _then_ we get some grub.” She grinned. “Not literally, unless you like Alternian cuisine? There are a few places for that too!”

The stairs creaked in a nice realistically homey way as they both returned to the living area. The bones of this house were nice, if almost completely unadorned. Not so much as a landscape painting hung on the wall.

There was a throw blanket on the sofa. Rolal wrapped it around herself as she puttered around. From a familiar black ring box left on the table, she pulled out a small USB. Moving to the TV, she traced her fingers lightly along the sides, her tongue poking out until she found the port she needed and plugged the receiver in.

“Get cozy, Jake. You want a coffee? We got a k-cup thing.”

“I’ll keep, thank you,” he said, belatedly dropping his shouldered bag onto the ground by the sofa. Rolal dropped herself against the arm, and Jake settled himself into the open seat next to her.

She pulled her legs up and draped the blanket around herself. “Brr, right?”

The television turned on, flipped to one of the alternate sources, and the amber hue of Timaeus’ technologic facade overtook the screen. “The subject of a million analyses and thinkpieces across the tangled web of tech blogs and pop culture sites. Everyone has taken a side in the debate: shellphone or spectre,” Timaeus began in a staid, steady voice.

Rolal sunk down against the sofa arm, half draping herself against it. “He can be so dramatic,” she stage-whispered to Jake. “I think he rehearses these ahead of time.”

“Understanding your target is important, Rolal. There’s more to this than knowing which vents lead to the roof and how to kill the right alarms.” He sounded just slightly testy. “There are more of these phones in circulation than personal computers, and they are the salt we build our silicon empires on.”

“Sure thing, Lifehacker,” Rolal drawled.

Jake winced. “Sorry,” he said softly, “but I’m a little newer to this, and would like to…”

She gave Jake a look, lifted eyebrows and all. “Someone who _wants_ to listen to Tima rattle on? Wow. He’s gonna love you.” She mimed zipping her lips and held up her fingers in an ‘okay’.

“As I was saying,” Timaeus started up again, not audibly ruffled by the interruption. His voice was smooth and even as he spoke, and some high tech powerpoint played on the screen, showing relevant news articles and finance charts and market share factoids. “As far as major targets go, there are few outside world governments that have a larger bullseye. Crockercorp has more liquid money than the US government, and they are closely tied to Egbert Advancements, which is nothing to snub. While spectres are wildly cheaper, they have a hefty footprint thanks to their easier accessibility.

“With John Egbert-Crocker’s death, the future of Egbert Advancements is up in the air. The FTC has blocked Crockercorp from devouring the spectres like a tasty morsel thrice already. But even then, the divide between them has been increasingly euphemistic, especially since the Condessa married Egbert. You can bet every anti-trust lawyer in the world is going to be auditioning for the Fuschia Terror, gunning for the chance to lead the charge to help her win her high stakes game of Monopoly.”

Rolal took out her own phone, looking at something her hands tucked into her blanket. After a second, the device let out a shut down chime, and went black. “Ugh,” she groaned.

Timaeus went on, as a new image took over the screen. It was a woman, roughly Jake’s age, with very neat black hair and a hollow smile. Even in the still image, her eyes behind her glasses seemed distant and cold.

“Things will be hairy for a while, since Egbert left the company not to his wife, but to his daughter. Jane’s the sole proprietor, and while leaving everything to her might’ve been Egbert’s way to keep the companies separate, Jane _is_ a Crocker.” The building Jake had passed before, the flashy headquarters just off Michigan, appeared next to the woman’s portrait. “She’s overseeing operations at Spectre HQ for the time being. It’s not going to be long before the Condessa swoops in. Our window is limited.”

None of this was particularly shocking. The moment Jake understood he was headed for Chicago, he’d assumed this was the target.

Still. There was something about the sadness in Jane Crocker’s face, how it spilled out past her stern blank expression. This was a woman who’d just lost her father.

This was not the place for sentiment. Jake put it away, nodding to himself.

“Our target is twofold. Rolal, you’ll want to sit up for this.”

“Nah,” she said, even as she fixed her gaze on the screen at long last. It was really enlightening in a strange way; yesterday, Jake would never have bought the idea that Timaeus would sell his most consistent collaborator up the river. Now, the idea was crystallizing, and clarity shone through.

Jake didn’t think Timaeus appreciated this much unprofessionalism. So, it made a little more sense.

“The Condessa came to earth with enough Alternian gold and artifacts to sink a tanker. It’s the kind of asset cache that the IRS would love to get hard numbers on.” Yet another insert box appeared, overlapping the building and Jane Crocker herself. It was a wide shot of what looked like a museum; clean lines and glass cases and suspended treasures inside. “In a monument to tax evasion, the Condessa gifted much of her collection to her new stepdaughter, who wisely set it up as an Alternian heritage showcase. It’s open to the public on alternate weekends, which looks much better on tax forms than a dragon’s hoard.”

“Nice,” Rolal said with intense feeling. “I’m going to need another storeroom. Or three.”

“A few things are highly requested acquisitions,” Timaeus said. “We need to lift a few of those. Any other items you want to collect are your own business. Don’t care.”

“You’re the most boring criminal in the world,” she told him gravely. “Who cares about a few extra zeroes on the bank account when you got a real threshecutioner scimitar on the mantle?”

“Moving on,” Timaeus said.

“I assume there is another, more subtle target in this heist,” Jake said quietly. “Stealing a bunch of very expensive treasures would be the diversion tactic for….?”

The screen changed again: this time, a blueprint dominated the building. “Of course. While most of the R&D work is spread across sites around the country, this is where operations are controlled. There’s a lot of very privileged information that is stored in this location alone.”

“Aren’t you a hacker type?” Jake asked.

“I am. But the building is a black box, essentially. There is one command center that organizes the work of the rest of the company, but everything else is kept on a highly limited intranet system.

“Now, the blueprints I’ve gotten from the city government server are out of date by about twelve years. Security is all internal and inaccessible to the outside, so physically casing the place is necessary. But our real goal is to gain access to the main server rooms-- wherever they are-- and get the data there.”

“What’s in them? The secret locked up servers?”

“My own payment for the job,” Timaeus said. “And potentially yours too, depending on what I find.”

Rolal sighed. “Boring financial stuff again.”

“It pays the bills,” Timaeus said, and the windows open on the TV winked out. “I have a vague plan of action plotted out, but it’ll be useless without more recon. We’ll start tomorrow. The rest of the evening’s yours.”

The TV shut itself off and Rolal grinned, clapping her hands together. “Excellent! How you feel about some dinner, Jake?”

Jake was still for a moment, listening to the silence in the wake of Timaeus’ debriefing. Like before, there was no sign that he’d turned away and stopped supervising. The cybernetic eye of their organizer was fleeting and damned difficult to track.

When there were no more words filling his ears from the ether, Jake nodded. “What’d you have in mind?”

 

* * *

 

Rolal left the safehouse, promising to bring back something “scrumptious.” In her wake, Jake brought his belongings upstairs and availed himself to the shower down the hall. It felt good to wash the airplane tackiness off himself, and to have the privacy to finally let himself catch up with the events of the past two days. The shower seemed to be the only real hidden place, clear of all of Timaeus’ monitoring.

Jake braced his arms against the wall and rested his forehead against the cool tiles while the water pounded hot against his back.

Afterward, he dressed in a tee shirt and a pair of soft flannels. Upon leaving the bathroom, he could hear movement downstairs, and went to greet it.

Rolal had pulled the cushions off the sofa and set them on the floor on either side of the coffee table. She had boxes set out and a four-pack of miniature wine bottles. “Hey, squeaky clean boy! Go fill up two glasses with ice.”

Armed with the requested glasses, Jake dropped onto the cushion opposite her. “This is kind of you.”

“Kind of what?” She laughed and took a glass, upending one bottle of white wine into it. “I’m just messin’. It’s important we enjoy this stuff, you know?”

“I suppose,” Jake said mildly. “What’re we having?”

“Bao! Little lumps of love.” She opened the two boxes on the table; inside were rows of roundish dumplings. Reaching in, Rolal grabbed a few and switched them from box to box, swapping them around. “There, that should be good and mixed up.” She pushed one box in front of Jake.

All of the dumplings looked the same. That appeared to be the point, as Rolal bit one in half and made a happy noise. “Coconut matcha! It’s excellent.”

The coconut cream was indeed good, soft and sweet in the doughy shell. But even better was the hoisin chicken. The chocolate was gooey and melty, a little too rich with the chicken. But overall, it was fun to bite into something and get a treat each time.

“We can have different stuff every night. There’s plenty of shops by the Loop. There’s even this pub that makes, like, authentic Yorkshire pudding and roast, it’s _amazing_ ,” she expounded between sips of wine.

Jake nodded. “That’d be nice to try.”

“Never had any?”

Picking up his own glass, Jake took a long drink for himself. Was she testing him? He was sure his accent hadn’t failed, but it was a weird coincidence, that she would mention something almost obnoxiously British. Or he was just being paranoid. “Is it true there’s a place that serves nothing but different kinds of mac and cheese?”

“Yes! I think it’s on Wabash? We can hit it up tomorrow on our way back.” She leaned her cheek on her hand. “So what y’do when you’re not doin’ this?”

“Oh, you know. Jobs here and there.” He picked up another bao to hazard a bite into. “What about you? You seem to know all the best spots around town.”

“I know the best spots in every town,” Rolal shot back. “Don’t assume I’m a Chi-town girl, I’m all over. You should know that.”

“Why would I know that?”

“Oh my goooood. Jake.” She spread her arms. “I’m kind of a big deal! We don’t have to, like. Pretend.”

The conversational floor felt unsteady and treacherous. “I might’ve heard a few things. I’m just… perhaps a little star struck? I’m small time compared to you. You’ve been to space!”

“Heh, yeah.” She seemed relaxed, tucking hair behind her ear. “But we all start somewhere, and if Tima picked you, either you were the best for the job… or the only person he could wrestle up on short notice. Either or.”

Jake snorted. “Don’t much know myself.”

Which was unfortunately a little too truthful for Jake’s liking. After putting in some time socializing, Jake felt a natural yawn come on, and let it loose with an accompanying stretch.

“Yeah, okay,” Rolal said, smirking. “You’re free to go and crash.”

“Sorry, but yeah, I’m bushed. Airplanes always take it out of me.” He climbed to his feet and replaced his cushion on the sofa. “I’ll see you bright and early?”

“Sure. I’m eating your leftovers. If I counted right, there’s one more chocolate sucker in here somewhere.” Already, she was tipping his box over to look inside.

“Please, avail yourself,” he said. “Goodnight.”

He made his way back upstairs, and could not shake the thought. Now that it seemed he was in the thick of it, the question was so much more important.

Why him?

Jake didn’t bother with the lights, just dropping his shirt by the foot of his bed and climbing in. The sheets were cold, and he tucked his legs up closer, making himself smaller in hopes of warming up faster.

Timaeus needed someone like him, that reasoning checked out. Now that Jake understood the parameters of the job ahead of him, Timaeus’ recruitment of an agent to provide a buffer was perfectly understandable. And his offer of Rolal to make Jake more willing to play along was genius.

But it couldn’t just be that, surely? Was it the cold algorithm of a criminal mastermind that picked Jake out? And was that scarier than the alternative?

The house was quiet. It was obviously insulated for sound; Jake lived in London and the city was never this quiet at night. Jake rolled over, looking at the strip of light under the door. Should he lock the door? Would that be rude? Would it even make him feel better? He doubted a locked door would keep Rolal at bay if this was an elaborate murder setup.

Jake squeezed his eyes shut and sighed. He needed to sleep.

Silence was not helpful.

With a blind reach, Jake grabbed his phone, rolling over onto his back to stand it on his chest. Perhaps a little artificial noise would help.  He had one of those apps on his old phone, for when things got just a little too much in his cavernous noggin.

He thumbed the phone on, the orange light washing over him. It was fairly kind on his eyes, and he blinked for a moment, just soaking it in like a plant in the sun.

There was a search bar parked at the top of the home screen.

Jake tapped it and plugged in ‘timaeus.’

He knew the very basics from the file MI6 had. It was some Greek thing. Like a play, or something? With a little searching, Jake found some pages; such was the links to that name, there were a few entries about Timaeus The Criminal. But since most of the potentially high-profile crimes were still under wraps, there were more results for something about Plato.

That would likely change when the world discovered Egbert’s cause of death was murder.

“What are you looking for?”

Jake shut his eyes a moment. “No offense meant. I’m not terribly versed in the classics and was hoping to pad out my own knowledge.”

“They don’t make every field agent at MI6 read the dialogues? I’m hurt. What if some vital clue was hidden in them?”

“No one thinks you so foolish.” He opened his eyes. “You know, I’ve put my finger on it. The AI thing is probably terribly insulting to you, but you know, you can always tell when someone’s about to say something because that inhale beforehand.”

Timaeus hummed quietly. “My microphone deadens it. It’s supposed to smooth the end user experience.”

“It’s just a little uncanny valley, when it seems like you don’t breathe.” The phone winked off, just a normal timeout. Jake didn’t turn it back on. “Why Plato then? _Is_ it some deep puzzle clue we’ve all overlooked?”

“No,” he said. It was quiet, as if in deference to the hour. It’d be easy to pretend the fellow was here in the dark too, with a voice like that. “I just remembered it well.”

“Did you learn it all proper? Or… dunno.”

“Not going to tell you that, English,” Timaeus said, chiding. Then, “‘Let this, then, be our invocation of the Gods, to which I add an exhortation of myself to speak in such manner as will be most intelligible to you, and will most accord with my own intent.’”

Jake rolled onto his side. “Is that like invoking the muse?”

“Careful there, agent. Your accent is slipping.”

“Tired. Some cad had me flying around the world with like an hour’s notice.” Jake sighed. “So what’s it mean?”

“It’s a fairly long ponderance on the nature of the universe. A lot about the duality of things. Life versus death, rational versus emotional. I always enjoyed the concept of the demiurge, the benevolent god force. Types of things, like fire. First flame, then the emanations that don’t burn but only give light to the eyes, then the remains of hot embers in the wake. There’s a lot of good language in it.”

“It’s no wonder you’re so sought after,” Jake remarks. “You’ve a damned soothing voice, Timaeus.”

The silence after is marked and clear. Jake rewinds his own words and winces. “Erm. Sorry, that was probably… Exhaustion and wine, you know, ha ha.”

“Most people remove their earpiece for sleep,” Timaeus says, either mercifully letting Jake’s foot in mouth go unremarked or punishing him in his own new way.

“Oh,” Jake says.

“Which you clearly aren’t. Sleeping or taking it out.”

Jake shuts his eyes again, as if that would help things along. “I’ve always had trouble sleeping in new places. And this one is mighty quiet besides. Downright eerie for the heart of a city.”

“Well, there’s a few things you could try. The med cabinet is well stocked. There’s melatonin. Benadryl if you want something stronger. Ambien if you absolutely need to be knocked the hell out. I could put some slow jams on. Or white noise, if you prefer. A track of city noises, if you’re homesick. That or you could take a more manual approach. Up to you.”

“Do you give this much care and attention to all your clients?” Jake asked. Then, like a record skip, he sucked in a breath. “Uh, manual?”

“A service I _do_ provide is outlining all options. Take them as you will.”

His voice was quieter, sure, but still like granite: stony and cool with a distance. It was compelling in a most literal sense, which chafed strangely against Jake like this, without direct orders to follow, but still primed.

He wondered what he’d do if Timaeus did make it an order.

Instead, he asked, “What, with you watching?”

“No way around that. I’m the walls and pillars in this house, you could write my name in blue, Navidson, I’m ever observant.”

It was a little flip, but still somehow lodged in Jake’s head. “That sounds exhausting,” he murmured. “Being eyes on all the time.”

The silence returned. Jake wished he could hear the man breathe.

“Do you sleep, Timaeus?”

He heard it then, a _sigh_ , long and deep and lush over the line. “I do. But not before you.”

“I must be a terrible inconvenience.”

“Part of the job.” He paused. “You should sleep.”

“I should,” Jake agreed. The jittery urge to move was too much. He shifted, restless, and made a decision, and tucked his hand under the duvet, pressing his fist against his stomach. His own skin felt overhot.

“And what,” Timaeus said, words drawn out like drips of honey, “are you doing about it, agent?”

Thank god it was dark. Jake pretended that mattered, pretended it made sense for Timaeus to let something as trivial as the dark blind his vision. “Not me doing the work, really.”

“Well. You’re the last one awake now. We should probably do something about that. Per our arrangement, you’re supposed to follow along.”

“Right,” Jake said.

“Put your hand in your pants. Get yourself hard.”

Jake plucked the band of his pants up with his nails, scratching lightly down against the hair until he could get a palm pressed against the curve of his dick. “Done.”

“I’m flattered,” Timaeus said. “Start stroking.”

Jake sucked in a lungful of air and gripped himself, relieved. “Slower,” Timaeus said, and Jake winced, but obeyed.

He’d imagined something more human filling out Timaeus’ voice in the dark secrecy of the room. Now, it smoothed to something almost practiced, closer to the steely tone he used when giving direction. It punched Jake in the gut with unexpected heat, and he couldn’t help but wait for the next order.

It took too long to come; Jake exhaled hard, his hand wet as he worked the wetness from the head down with his palm. Finally: “Faster. Squeeze harder.”

Jake nodded, turned his cheek against the pillow as he renewed his previous tempo. His heart was pounding in his ears. It was too hot, the blanket still up to his chest. He wasn’t willing to kick it away. Not now, it was just too much right now.

“It’s late. You need to either get off or go try out the medical help. Are you close?”

“Yes,” Jake admitted, face burning.

“Then do it, now.”

He wasn’t _that_ close, but he didn’t have a choice. He couldn’t imagine going soft and just going to bed now. It was a rush of tense, exhilarating sensation pounding in his blood, beating like a drum in his head and against his hand as he tried so hard, his other hand fisting in the pillow by his head. Timaeus said now, so Jake grit his teeth and came now, so sharp it yanked a winded noise out of him.

His head spun holding his breath; he gasped, sagging tiredly back.

Fuck. Jake’s hand was tacky. He dried it weakly against his pajama pants before kicking the whole mess off, out of bed and onto the floor.

The silence was back. Not empty this time, like a hollow bell. It rang with some kind of presence, something heavy.

Jake rolled onto his side. Briefly, he considered saying goodnight. Or thanking his unseen benefactor.

It seemed rude to presume, or to break the hard-earned peace that seized him. So, pushing it away, Jake shut his eyes.

 

* * *

  


Timaeus watched the sound wave dance on his monitor, his finger pressed hard enough against his mute hotkey his fingernail was bending awkwardly.

But English was dropping off like a rock down a hill, tumbling into sleep. He was one of those guys who fell asleep right after an orgasm. That hadn’t been in the file Timaeus compiled on him.

Neither had been the predilection for following orders in this much less professional capacity. He wondered if it was somewhere in MI6’s psych profiles. Was it stamped out in staid analytical verbage somewhere? Had he not dug deep enough?

It was a lot easier to think about pointless invasive personnel control than what he’d just done.

“Holy shit,” Timaeus said as he finally dragged his hand away from the keyboard.

Holy shit. He took off his headset, resting it on the desk, and tried very hard to ignore the pervasive heat that burned in his abdomen.

Holy shit, how was he going to get to sleep now?

“Fuck,” Timaeus said, and got up. He needed another shower. Cold would be best. Hot was more likely though.

Control, he thought vividly. He needed to keep fucking control.

He would. Starting tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> content: VOIP phonesex i guess? and some submissive play
> 
> fun fact, chicago was the first big city i ever went to and my first night there, i nearly got in deep shit. someone on the street grabbed me and started telling me that she lost her daughter and needed help, and my dumb small town ass was concerned for this poor woman, until my friend came along, physically grabbed me, and pulled me away to safety
> 
> i was a _dumbass_
> 
> chicago is amazing for food tourism tho, 4 real. and as someone who has always lived in places without public transport, the L system mystified me.


End file.
